It was a perfect opportunity for me to answer a long-standing prayer inspired a few years earlier by a visit to a children’s shelter in San Diego for at-risk children from the very young through teenage years. During the tour I noticed a tiny boy who was sitting all by himself in a chair in a corner of the room. He had on a little hat, and he was holding his head in his hands, as lost and alone as anyone I’d ever seen in my life. I asked about him and discovered that he was there because his mother was in jail on drug charges and for mercilessly beating him. He broke my heart, and I couldn’t get the image of him, and of someone laying a hand on him in anger, let alone beating such a helpless, precious child, out of my mind. That image was the inspiration for countless prayers: “Please, God, let me find an active, meaningful way to help as many precious children as I can who are as lost and helpless as that tiny little boy.”
So along came Carol Williams and Interval House, the answer to all those prayers. They were about to have their annual banquet and charity auction, and I wouldn’t have missed it for anything in the world. The Ritz-Carlton hotel donated accommodations for us out-of-town guests. Helen Reddy, Beverly Garland, Shirley Jones, and Marcia Clark were part of the festivities. It was a spectacular event, one of those amazing evenings when every single person in the room was there not out of some sense of obligation or as a meaningless publicity ploy, but simply because of a shared commitment to a truly inspired and inspiring cause.
My treasured relationship with Interval House continues to this day, and I hope you’ll read more about the organization on its website, www.intervalhouse.org. And if you or a loved one needs help, please keep its hotline numbers on hand: (562) 594-4555 and (714) 891-8121.
I have copies of one of my favorite quotes hanging in three separate places in my house so that I can’t take more than a few steps in any direction without being reminded:
I hold that the more helpless a creature, the more entitled it is
to protection by man from the cruelty of man.
—MAHATMA GANDHI
In the first chapter I told you about my father surprising me with a puppy that woke me out of a sound sleep with a million nose kisses. I named my puppy Patrick, and my God, did I adore that little guy.
When I was nine years old, our neighbor showed up at the door with Patrick in her arms. It seems my puppy had found his way to their yard, and her husband had kicked him hard enough to break a couple of his ribs and cause internal bleeding. There wasn’t much our veterinarian could do for Patrick, so I simply stayed with him every second, including pitching a tent and sleeping with him every night, until he passed away three days later.
I’m not sure which was more overwhelming—my badly broken heart, or my rage and horror at the neighbor, or anyone, who could be cruel to a puppy, or to any other living thing. I still feel the same heartbreak, rage, and horror when I look back on it, and I vividly remember thinking, “I’m not always going to be nine years old. Someday when I have a voice I’ll find a way to do for other animals what I couldn’t do for Patrick.”
Well, I’m not nine years old anymore, and I sure as hell have a voice now, which I’ve devoted to many animal causes, most notably Humane Society International. A portion of the group’s mission statement reads, “We work to reduce suffering and to create meaningful social change for animals by advocating for sensible public policies, investigating cruelty and working to enforce existing laws, educating the public about animal issues, joining with corporations on behalf of animal-friendly policies, and conducting hands-on programs that make ours a more humane world. We are a leading disaster relief agency for animals, and we provide direct care for thousands of animals at our sanctuaries and rescue facilities, wildlife rehabilitation centers, and mobile veterinary clinics.” As if that wasn’t enough to inspire me to become one of the Humane Society’s spokeswomen and continue to be an advocate to this day, I also love another part of its mission: “extolling the human-animal bond.”
That promise manifests itself in a way that touches me deeply, that I hope will spread throughout the world, and it’s such a simple solution to a lot of loneliness. Thanks to the efforts of the Humane Society, senior citizens in many assisted-living homes in Canada are allowed to have pets. I’ve personally witnessed extraordinary transformations in so many people when they were able to wake up every morning with a little soul to care for and love and be unconditionally loved by, when they had purpose to their days again, when they weren’t alone anymore. It made a difference that was nothing short of miraculous, and God only knows how many animals have been rescued and given loving homes thanks to this beautiful program.
And for the record, yes, I do speak from experience, by the way. I live with and treasure three dogs of my own—Daisy, Bishop, and Crackerjack. They bring me more joy and laughter and love and devotion than I can ever repay, and I literally can’t imagine how empty my life would be without them.
Please visit the Humane Society’s website, www.humanesociety.org, and help if you can. Believe me, every dime of every donation makes a difference to a precious soul that has no voice of its own.
In 1975 I went to New Orleans for Mardi Gras with my friend Colbert “Bud” Baker. We had a spectacular time, during which Bud introduced me to his son, Tim. We talked, we laughed, we enjoyed the fabulous French Quarter, and I flew home without a clue that I’d just met a man who would become an important part of my life more than three decades later.
Tim Baker moved to Midland, Texas, in the 1980s, and in the process of making it his home he found himself compelled to get involved in the area’s “recovery community”—friends and neighbors whose lives were being ripped apart by drug and alcohol addictions. Many of them, even the most committed ones, had tried to overcome those addictions and failed, which inspired Tim to start exploring treatment methods that would maximize the odds of success. The result was an office in downtown Midland that housed a not-for-profit facility, founded by Tim and named the Springboard Center, devoted to treating chemical dependency.
Several years, grants, and private donations later, Tim was able to realize his ultimate dream for the Springboard Center: to house it in a new state-of-the-art treatment and recovery complex. He called one day to tell me about it, and the more he talked, the more excited I got. So when he asked if I would consider being the center’s national spokesperson, I answered with an immediate, emphatic, “Yes!”
I may never have been to Midland, Texas, before, but God knows I’d been a substance abuser in need of help. I knew what those clients were going through and what it would take for them to recover and be whole again, and everything Tim had described sounded like exactly what I knew to be true and workable. What a perfect way for me to honor all those people who’d been there for me during my addiction and recovery, a perfect way to “pay it forward.”
So off I went to the groundbreaking ceremony for the new facility in May 2008, surrounded by the rolling plains and endless skies of Midland. I was back in November to tour the thirteen-thousand-square-foot building as it neared completion, and in May 2009 I proudly attended the Springboard Center’s grand opening.
This eighteen-bed facility is unique among rehab and treatment programs. The focus is on restoring health and dignity to clients and their families through diet and nutrition; emotional, mental, and spiritual development; exercise; education; and the development of self-sufficiency skills. A unique treatment plan is created for each individual client, since everyone arrives with their own history and their own set of problems and circumstances. The brilliantly trained staff of doctors, nurses, counselors, and therapists is on duty every hour of every day of the year. And incredibly, there’s nothing exclusive, elitist, or cost-prohibitive about the Springboard Center. It’s not reserved for the wealthy and privileged. The cost is based on the client’s ability to pay, so no one is turned away based on a lack of funds or insurance. The center really is truly available to anyone who needs help—more than six thousand souls and their fa
milies so far, in fact.
Plans are currently under way for a new wing that will expand the facility to twenty-four beds, and for stables and a riding ring to capitalize on the almost magical connection between recovering clients and the magnificent strength and beauty of horses. I’ve been back to Midland several times for fund-raising events, and I’ll be back whenever Tim and the center need me. Every time I visit I’m even more touched, more inspired, more energized, and more committed to this amazing nonprofit cause, which, as far as I’m concerned, should be used as a template for other substance abuse treatment and recovery centers throughout the country.
If I sound passionate about the Springboard Center, it’s only because I am. I saw it rise out of the Texas soil into a complex any community would be proud to call its own, and I’ve also personally talked to dozens of clean, sober, grateful clients who’d failed at other facilities and almost given up any hope of recovery until they found their way to Midland.
Please visit the Springboard Center’s website, www.springboardcenter.com, to read more about the extraordinary work my friend Tim Baker and his colleagues are doing there. Whether or not you can help, whether or not you or a loved one needs help, I’m excited for you to know where a big part of my heart is invested these days.
No matter who you are, no matter where you are, no matter what your circumstances, you can change the life of a soul who needs you right this minute. It’s the quickest cure for loneliness, boredom, and depression you’ll ever find. Isn’t it thrilling to know that you can wake up tomorrow morning and, before the day is over, make a difference? That you can matter to someone, even if you’re just doing it for your own sense of self-worth?
Not because you have to, but because you want to.
Because it’s right.
Because you’ll get back everything you give and more.
Because we can all use some hope right now in these tough times.
Because we have no choice.
Afterword
I admit it, I didn’t exactly leap at the idea of writing my memoirs, and not because I was reluctant to tell you my secrets. In fact, I think I’d be one of the hardest people on earth to blackmail—threaten to expose some “dirt” about me and I’ll be on the phone with the press in a heartbeat to expose it myself. I just wasn’t sure I was ready to dredge up some of my more painful memories and feel them all over again.
But the truth is, I’ve enjoyed every minute of it, even the hard parts. It’s been cathartic. It’s been liberating. It may have even saved me thousands of dollars in therapy bills. And it gave me a chance to relive the impossibly happy times and feel those all over again too, and be reminded that they far overshadow the occasional darkness.
I thank you for walking through these pages with me and for caring enough to take that walk. It’s because of each of you that I have so much joy to share and look back on and look forward to, and if you only take away one truth from this book, I hope it’s this: I’m living proof that you can overcome mistakes, substance abuse, and plenty of bad choices, and as long as you fight hard to keep your heart in the right place and full of gratitude, you can wake up one morning and realize that you really are a blessed, purposeful, exhilarated eighty-three-year-old.
And now, if you’ll excuse me, I’ve got a seven A.M. hair and makeup call.
Acknowledgments
I’m overwhelmed trying to think of everyone who’s more than earned my heartfelt thanks for their contributions to my life. The complete list would demand a book of its own. I pray that those of you I’m inadvertently forgetting know how much you mean to me, and that I’ll never stop finding other ways to express my gratitude.
But for now . . .
To Tom Langan, my longtime producer and cherished friend to this very day.
To John Conboy, the creator and master of the “new look” of television in the 1970s, who taught me the elegance of Katherine Chancellor.
To Josh O’Connell, associate producer of The Young and the Restless, who quietly, and often without nearly enough thanks, makes everything happen.
To each and every member of the Y&R crew, the true unsung heroes of our show. It’s an honor to know you and work shoulder to shoulder with you.
To Lindsay Harrison, for convincing me to tell my story, for being the animal lover she is, and for epitomizing the word “friend.”
To Michael Gregory, the Greek in my life.
To Dr. James Todd, the young dentist who wanted to meet Katherine Chancellor, did, and became, along with his wife, Susan, my “active friend” for thirty-eight long years.
To my amazing, loyal, generous Canadians, for your love and friendship over all these decades, every bit of which is reciprocated, and for the spectacular celebrations honoring my fifty years in show business. I haven’t forgotten, and I never will.
To Marilyn and Conrad Welle—“Viva Las Vegas!”
To Virginia Swanson, the intrepid PI of scams.
To our literary agent, Jennifer DeChiara, and to Lisa Sharkey and Amy Bendell, without whom this book wouldn’t have happened.
And to every single one of you who’s ever watched and supported Katherine Chancellor and The Young and the Restless. We, every one of us, owe it all to you.
Photographic Section
My parents and grandparents at the Taft oil fields (mother, in black, holding me), looking like a group audition for The Grapes of Wrath.
Photo courtesy of the author
Even at eight years old I knew—it’s all about the hair.
Photo courtesy of the author
A rare shot of just me and Daddy.
Photo courtesy of the author
Eighteen and surviving my first broken heart.
Photo courtesy of the author
Good-bye, Taft . . . look out, Pasadena.
Photo courtesy of the author
Daddy, Evelyn, Jack, and me—one of our last moments together.
Photo courtesy of the author
Off to Alaska with Ann Blythe, while Universal flew in our replacements behind our backs.
Photo courtesy of the author
The good news: starring in Best Foot Forward on stage. The bad news: having to sit like this to promote it.
Photo courtesy of the author
Adding “sultry” to my repertoire for $250 a week.
Photo courtesy of the author
Harry and me, straining for happiness in Venice while I shot The Vikings.
Photo courtesy of the author
Harry, baby Corbin and me—Harry smiling longingly over at my checkbook.
Photo courtesy of the author
One thing I’ll say about Harry and me: we did make three spectacular children (from left to right, that’s Corbin, Collin, and Caren).
Photo courtesy of the author
You thought Angelina Jolie invented this move?
Photo courtesy of the author
A “candid” shot of me shopping in Beverly Hills with two Russian wolfhounds and a studio photographer.
Photo courtesy of the author
Maureen O’Hara, in The Redhead from Wyoming (center), taught me well: “If you can’t see the camera, the camera can’t see you.”
Courtesy of Universal Pictures Company, Inc.
From The Big Valley, on which I guest-starred with my great pal Barbara Stanwyck.
Courtesy of Universal Pictures Company, Inc.
Happily upstaged by the chimpanzees in Black Zoo—not the first or last time I’d fall in love with my costars.
Photo courtesy of the author
With Paul Winchell and Jerry Mahoney—or, as I came to see them, Harry’s idea of the perfect relationship.
Photo courtesy of the author
“What’s that, Harry? Another business trip? Really?” (Actually, just a press photo for The Man from U.N.C.L.E.)
Photo courtesy of the author
In Kansas City Bomber with Raquel Welch, one of Hollywood’s most underrated actresses.
Photo courtesy of the author
My first Y&R cast photo in 1973, me (top row) wondering how I’d last all the way through a three-year contract.
Courtesy of The Young and the Restless
Onscreen and off, I found Quinn Redeker irresistible.
Photo courtesy of the author
My televised face-lift—I’m in this for the glamour.
Photo courtesy of the author
One of my greatest thrills—playing Corbin’s on-screen mom on L.A. Law and both of us being honored with Emmy nominations.
Photo courtesy of the author
My alter-alter-ego, Marge Catrooke, whom I adored. May she rest in peace—and come back soon.
Photo courtesy of the author
My friend Diane Sawyer, a beauty inside and out.
Photo courtesy of the author
My son Collin and my boss Bill Bell literally saved my life.
Not Young, Still Restless Page 19